The Ides

 The 15th of March – the ill-fated Ides – is one of those dates that has a poem ready-made: in this case, a typically luminous work by the great Alexandrian poet Constantin Cavafy, that 'Greek gentleman in a straw hat standing absolutely motionless at a slight angle to the universe' (as E.M. Forster described him). He was a poet for whom the past was never another country but a world at least as real as the present, and whose short, lucid poems are 'about' so much more than their ostensible historical subject. He translates well too. The translation here is by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard – 

'Guard, O my soul, against pomp and glory.
And if you cannot curb your ambitions,
at least pursue them hesitantly, cautiously.
And the higher you go,
the more searching and careful you need to be.

And when you reach your summit, Caesar at last—
when you assume the role of someone that famous—
then be especially careful as you go out into the street,
a conspicuous man of power with your retinue;
and should a certain Artemidoros
come up to you out of the crowd, bringing a letter,
and say hurriedly: “Read this at once.
There are things in it important for you to see,”
be sure to stop; be sure to postpone
all talk or business; be sure to brush off
all those who salute and bow to you
(they can be seen later); let even
the Senate itself wait—and find out immediately
what grave message Artemidoros has for you.'